Okay, we get it. Now send money.

The Donley County courthouse in Clarendon was one of the few Panhandle courthouses fortunate enough to get a full restoration. Meanwhile, Texas is nationally recognized for having endangered courthouses.

Embarassing? Yes. Can we do much about it? Probably not.

For the second time, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has named Texas county courthouses as a group to its “America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places.”

“The unveiling of the list is always a bittersweet moment,” according to a post on the group’s website. “But the fact that the list even exists means that there’s a lot more work still to be done.”

Let’s cut to the chase. The Texas Historical Commission says 128 courthouses have been approved for the state’s program to help with expenses and expertise. Of those, 83 have had their plans funded. Panhandle courthouses on the list of those restored since the program began in 1999, the year after Texas courthouses landed on the endangered list for the first time? Donley, Wheeler and soon Potter and Roberts out of 46 completed across the state. The partially restored list has Randall and Gray counties on it.

There are several reasons but paramount is money. By some stroke of luck or good planning, the legislature budgeted the restoration program $20 million for 2012-13 from the sale of bonds. That’s pretty good given state legislators cut the THC off at the knees in its general funding, like it did some other state agencies, and teachers in public schools didn’t fare much better in the budget balancing.

The only nearby county to get substantial funding for this fiscal year is the Hardeman County courthouse at Quanah. Not really the Panhandle, but almost.

So now what about all those other courthouses like Lipscomb’s that brings a whole new, or really old, meaning to historic. And Randall’s? restored outside and bedraggled inside?

Well, get in line. THC officials estimate the cost of restoring all 228 courthouses in the state designated historic, that means built before 1948, at $750 million. That’s a lot at $20 million a year.

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Quit wasting money in the name of Historical Preservation. The truth needs to be reported and that is the Maintenance Department(s) did not do their job in the first place by maintaining the court houses, otherwise they would not be in the poor shape they are.